The Celtic academy teen who could replace Liel Abada

This season, the gifted young player has been performing admirably for the B team.

Although Celtic’s January transfer window closed at the beginning of the month, they continued to sell players to other continents. Moving forward Liel Abada made a significant profit on the £3.5 million the club paid to sign him under Ange Postecoglou in the summer of 2021 when he was sold to MLS team Charlotte FC earlier this month for an alleged fee of £10 million. The ‘ongoing conflict in the Middle East’ had prevented the Israel international from playing frequently for the Hoops. Manager Brendan Rodgers explained this was because the player had personal issues that limited his participation on the pitch.

Celtic will not be able to sign a replacement from another club because they are moving him on outside of a transfer window. But Corey Thomson, a rising star on the B team right now, might surprise everyone by taking the 22-year-old whiz’s place. The numbers from Liel Abada’s Celtic career The right-sided forward left Parkhead after making 112 appearances for the Scottish powerhouses across all competitions, totaling 29 goals and 22 assists.

During his tenure in Glasgow, Abada demonstrated his ability to score goals as well as create them, averaging a direct goal contribution every 2.20 games. Despite only starting 13 league games, the explosive attacker made an impression in the Scottish Premiership last season under Postecoglou’s leadership, as the table above illustrates. He finished with 15 goals and 15 assists. With one goal in every 3.4 Premiership games on average, he had a significant impact as a goal scorer.

By inserting Thomson into the starting lineup, Rodgers could take his place as a goal threat. The B team stats for Corey Thomson The remarkable gem, who turned 18 in December of last year, has played a regular role for Celtic B in the Lowland League for the past two seasons. In 25 league games for the young Hoops during the 2022–2023 season, the teenage striker made a contribution with six goals and zero assists, or one goal every 4.1 games on average.

Corey Thomson take a bow! 👏

Celtic have turned it around! Two goals in two minutes!#BBCFootball #ScottishYouthCup pic.twitter.com/ihIDZcQ3c6

— BBC Sport Scotland (@BBCSportScot) May 3, 2023

In the Scottish Youth Cup, Thomson finished the campaign with a magnificent goal against Rangers, as seen in the video below.

Thomson cut inside expertly and fired the ball into the bottom corner. With seven goals and one assist in 20 games so far in the Lowland League during the 2023–24 season, the Scotland U18 international has increased his offensive production. This indicates that Thomson has scored for Celtic B on average every 2.9 league games this season, which is more often than Abada scored goals in the Premiership under Postecoglou the previous season.

Over the past two seasons, the Livingston-born starlet, who can play on either wing or through the middle as an attacking midfielder, has demonstrated his ability to regularly score goals from a wide position. Instead of entering the market in the summer to bring in a multi-million-pound heir, Rodgers now need to give the seven-goal academy dynamo an opportunity to demonstrate that he has the maturity and quality to make the leap to first team level and emerge as a surprise replacement for Abada from the youth set-up.

In other news, Exciting Celtic summer transfer update